Christmas is nearly  upon us and when we’re not listening to the general public screaming at us about how our employers have ruined their festive periods with their ineptitude, we’re being subjected to the horrors of “Christmas music.”

The tradition of having festive tunes is doubtless as old as the paganistic ritual of stuffing our faces during the darkest days of the year.  Unfortunately, the music is virtually always pish.  So rather than go all Scrooge McDuck, here’s our selection of the precious few Christmas songs that don’t make us want to carve out our eyeballs and put stuffing in our ears.

————————————————————————————————————————————–

1. Jacob Miller & Ray I – Deck The Halls

It must be said Reggae seems to contribute a large proportion of the non-hoaching Christmas songs, so it’s hard to narrow it down but this one is a personal favourite.

————————————————————————————————————————————–

2. The Whispers – Funky Christmas

Yeh, it’s cheesy but it’s Christmas disco…

————————————————————————————————————————————–

3. The Waitresses – Christmas Wrappin

Probably the only one which somehow sneaks into bog-standard Christmas compilations but we love it so why not? Post-punk finery from the Waitresses.

————————————————————————————————————————————–

4. Kurtis Blow – Christmas Rappin

Allegedly, the first hip-hop release on a major label (come at me geeks) from the legendary Kurtis Blow.  This is what old men call old school.  Ok, so it rests rather heavily on that Nile Rogers riff…but then so does “Get Lucky” and everyone’s been prancing around to that all year.  

————————————————————————————————————————————–

5. Destiny’s Child – 8 Days of Christmas

Before “Christmas magic” became synonomous with Beyoncé releasing surprise albums in the middle of the night, we had to settle for this little Destiny’s Child number.

————————————————————————————————————————————–

6. Genesis P-Orridge & Thee Majesty – Mary Never Wanted Jesus

It just wouldn’t be this time of year without some poorly thought out sacrilege.  So in spirit of the season, here’s a song about the world’s most famous unplanned pregnancy.

————————————————————————————————————————————–

7. Ludacris – Ludacrismas

In the dark days before he was thrilling us with his starring roles in ground breaking films like Fast and Furious 6 and 7, he could be found recording the soundtrack to Vince Vaughan Christmas films.  For what it’s worth, we quite like this one from the film “Fred Claus.”

————————————————————————————————————————————–

8. The Jive Turkeys – Funky Jesus

From the Ludacris to the sublime.  The Jive Turkeys, some musicians from a hip-hop band deliver some old-school Mid Western Funk like they’re not supposed to make anymore.

————————————————————————————————————————————–

9. Laro – Little Drummer Boy

A lot of versions of this tune to chose from including a 40 minute version by Lindstrom which is frankly more than just a bit silly but I think Laro’s version  appreciates the spirit of ruh puh pum pumming more than most others.

————————————————————————————————————————————–

10. That one with the Communist Cats

You know the one.

————————————————————————————————————————————–

MERRY CHRISTMAS

————————————————————————————————————————————–

Find us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/AThousandFlowers

Follow us on Twitter @unsavourycabal

————————————————————————————————————————————–